Problem: Ishaan is 3 times as old as William. Eight years ago, Ishaan was 5 times as old as William. How old is William now?
Explanation: We can use the given information to write down two equations that describe the ages of Ishaan and William. Let Ishaan's current age be $i$ and William's current age be $w$ The information in the first sentence can be expressed in the following equation: $i = 3w$ Eight years ago, Ishaan was $i - 8$ years old, and William was $w - 8$ years old. The information in the second sentence can be expressed in the following equation: $i - 8 = 5(w - 8)$ Now we have two independent equations, and we can solve for our two unknowns. Because we are looking for $w$ , it might be easiest to use our first equation for $i$ and substitute it into our second equation. Our first equation is: $i = 3w$ . Substituting this into our second equation, we get: $3w$ $-$ $8 = 5(w - 8)$ which combines the information about $w$ from both of our original equations. Simplifying the right side of this equation, we get: $3 w - 8 = 5 w - 40$ Solving for $w$ , we get: $2 w = 32.$ $w = 16$.